Lairs

'A poet who instinctively sees the possibilities of defamiliarisation wherever she casts her penetrating, colour-loving eye' -Carol Rumens, The Guardian

What do animal dens have in common with mathematics? Lairs is darkly suggestive of secretive havens and shelters, but also frames the poem as an equation. This collection is both a kind of nest and a beautiful accumulation of dense detail. Lairs also highlights the contrast between noble aspirations and a messy reality, the poems’ atmospheres being sometimes borrowed from the fervid pandemic lockdowns. The innovative style is daring and embraces complex music. Post-Brexit life is also a subtle strand in these poems, as they deflate and challenge establishment conservatism.